Voyah Taishan Review: The Chinese Flagship Hybrid SUV That Made Me Carsick

In Chinese, Tien Shan translates to “Heavenly Mountain.” And Taishan? “Mount Tai” — the sacred Taoist peak and a national symbol of stability. “Steady as Mount Tai,” as the saying goes in China. So why does the flagship Voyah Taishan plug-in hybrid need a three-chamber air suspension to live up to that name? After a full day behind the wheel, I have some thoughts — and some complaints.

Don’t see the air vents? They’re there: hidden behind the top edge of the lower part of the dashboard—there’s also a slot for installing the passenger display. Other pluses include powerful inductive charging and quiet climate control.

Is the Voyah Taishan Really a “Maybach from AliExpress”?

Enough with the snobbery already. Can’t we just be happy for the Chinese, who — for the price of a BMW X3 — are offering a genuinely imposing three-row SUV? In China, the Taishan starts at 380,000 yuan and tops out at half a million (roughly $52,000–$69,000 USD).
The problem? Italdesign appears not to know about it.

Hurray, physical buttons?! Unfortunately, most only bring up the corresponding menu tabs on the display.

The Italdesign Connection: Fact or Fiction?

Yes, Italdesign genuinely helped Dongfeng’s state-owned conglomerate launch the Voyah brand back in 2020 — they built the elegant i-Land concept coupé for the brand’s debut, and there was something distinctly Maserati-esque about the original Free. But:

The Free lost most of that Italian flair after its facelift
The Taishan in particular shows zero Italdesign DNA
Public records mention only two foreign stylists at Dongfeng — Frenchman Nicolas Huet (who once penned the BMW 1 Series) and German Henning Knopfle (from commercial vehicle industrial design)
Neither holds a top design role

So “East Wind” — once known as China’s Second Auto Works — is betting on home-grown design talent. That’s a different path from First Auto Works (FAW), which has put Briton Giles Taylor in charge of design at its Hongqi brand.

I miss the shoulder blade support, but the seat’s softness and massage effectiveness are excellent.

Voyah Taishan Exterior: Better Up Close

I’m tempted to give Dongfeng a Lenin-style thumbs up: “You’re on the right path, comrades!” Because up close, the Taishan stops looking like a knockoff and starts looking like a genuinely handsome, sizeable crossover. Provided you:

Don’t tap the cheap plastic on the chromed front shield
Skip the optional Maybach-aping monoblock wheels
Pass on the “starry sky” door-handle recesses
Stick with the Taishan Max+ trim, like the one I tested at E.N.Cars

The armrests are comfortable, but the door release button—they’re power-operated on this car—is a bit small.

Interior: Cozy, Not Quite Premium

The cabin makes you forget about the copycat criticisms entirely. Highlights include:

Smooth, harmonious door panel contours
Hidden ventilation deflectors built into the dashboard
Plush leather seats with genuinely excellent massage function
Auto-adjusting seat profile via a single button on the console

The auto-adjust didn’t quite work for me, though — the system inflated the lumbar support and loosened the side bolsters, when I needed the exact opposite. As the old saying goes: “Never mind my sunken chest — look at my barrel back!”

The seating position is high — closer to bus territory than passenger car — with a steering wheel angled flat. At least it’s a round wheel, hallelujah. The high cabin presumably exists to maximize space for the rear two rows.

Touchscreen displays on the motorized armrests are hardly convenient.

Cabin Space: Cramped for a 5.2-Meter SUV

Here’s the disappointment: for a vehicle 5.2 meters (17 feet) long, the Taishan feels surprisingly tight inside.

How it compares to rivals:

Lynk & Co 900 and Zeekr 9X: genuinely six-seater, third-row friendly
Voyah Taishan: the third row is a squeeze you can barely wedge into

The middle-row captain’s chairs are absurdly motorized — even the armrests have servo motors on both sides. But “zero gravity” mode on the right ottoman only lets you rest your feet on the folded front passenger seat. The cargo area is also modest, and its plain trim clashes with the Maybach-aspiring vibe up front.

In other words: this isn’t a Zeekr 9X or a Lynk & Co 900. It’s closer to the Deepal S09 in feel.

When unfolded, the ottoman somehow shifts toward the center, causing your left foot to rest against the center console.

Rear-Wheel Steering and Maneuverability

One genuine win: the Taishan offers four-wheel steering on the second-from-bottom Max+ trim, while:

The Deepal S09 doesn’t offer it at all
The Lynk & Co 900 restricts it to the top Explorer trim

Maneuverability is excellent, parking is a breeze, and visibility is solid. There’s even a “crab mode,” but it’s mostly for show — rear wheels can angle a maximum of 8 degrees, and the actuators turn them slowly, lagging behind any quick input. At highway speeds, the Taishan shows no signs of rear-wheel steering at all. Which, frankly, is better than a split-personality steering feel.

The Taishan has a fold-out ceiling display, but lacks a removable tablet like the Zikr 9X. However, the refrigerator in the center compartment is accessible from both the rear and top.

The Carsick Problem: Why the Suspension Disappoints

Hold on a second. Something’s rising in my throat. Strange — I’m not hungry, only had one coffee. Why do I suddenly want to quote absurdist literature about theaters where everyone gets sick?

Hard truth: the Voyah Taishan is the second car I’ve ever felt motion-sick driving. The first was a Jaguar XKR — but I was flogging it through serpentine mountain roads. The Taishan made me yawn and feel queasy after just five minutes of moderate driving.

Where, oh where, is that life-saving three-chamber suspension?

Fold-out tables are available on both the left and right sides.

Three-Chamber Air Suspension Explained

In theory, dividing the air spring into multiple chambers lets you combine:

Soft ride on straights (all chambers connected)
Firmer response in maneuvers (chambers isolated for stiffness)

This is why Porsche, Audi, and Bentley use this technology — often paired with rear-wheel steering. The Taishan should join this elite club. And it almost does:

It floats over highway undulations
It softly absorbs speed bumps

But it also pitches, rolls, and makes front-row passengers seasick. Holding the wheel tighter doesn’t help — there’s no real steering feedback except in High mode (the Taishan’s name for what every other carmaker calls Sport). The Magic Carpet system, which uses lidar to scan the road ahead and prepare the suspension for bumps, has clear limitations — you’ll still feel suspension thumps and shudders on rougher pavement.

The Taishan also lets you separately tune spring stiffness and damping in custom mode — a rare feature. I tried softening the air springs while keeping dampers firm. Even that combination loses to High mode, where “high” refers to the driver’s altered relationship with reality.

The trunk, with a capacity of just 305 liters, is sparsely finished, but the gallery seats are movable.

Voyah Taishan Powertrain and Performance

The drive modes are called “motivate modes” in custom settings — and only Sport actually motivates anything. Despite a curb weight of 2,852 kg (6,287 lbs), the Taishan launches softly but with real urgency.

Voyah Taishan Specifications

Total system output: 517 hp (two electric motors plus a 1.5-liter turbo engine)
Battery capacity: 65 kWh
Fuel tank: 65 liters
Curb weight: 2,852 kg
Length: 5.2 meters
Drivetrain: Series-parallel hybrid; ICE drives front wheels via single-speed reducer

Unlike Wey or Lynk & Co 900 hybrids — which use 2- and 3-speed transmissions respectively — the Taishan connects its engine to the front wheels through a simple reducer, just like the Zeekr 9X. The difference: Voyah ships a bigger battery and a bigger fuel tank than the Zeekr.

The 1.5-liter turbo is so quiet I never once noticed it engaging the wheels. On long drives, the Taishan should be both comfortable and economical — if you can ignore the suspension.

There’s a roomy storage compartment underneath.

Why Only Front-Row Passengers Get Carsick

Here’s the curious part: passengers in the second row don’t feel sick at all. Maybe Dongfeng engineered it this way deliberately — to motivate the driver to operate the car as smoothly as possible? It worked on me. I spent the entire test day thinking only about how to avoid braking or accelerating sharply.

That’s your real “motivate mode.”

The simpler explanation, of course, is that the Chinese haven’t yet mastered the full potential of three-chamber suspension. The Germans pioneered it and still get it wrong sometimes. Patience required. The good news: most of these flaws can be fixed via over-the-air software updates.

To assist the instrument display, there is a huge color projector

Voyah Taishan Competitors: A Crowded Flagship Segment

The Taishan enters arguably the most competitive segment in China — flagship hybrid SUVs in the “9-class.” The rival list is so long you run out of fingers:

Aito M9
Denza N9
Yangwang U8
Leapmotor D19
Wey V9X
Li L9
Zeekr 9X
Lynk & Co 900
Deepal S09
Rox 01 / Adamas
Volkswagen ID. ERA 9X

Where will Voyah’s Mount Tai-named flagship rank? Worth noting: the actual Mount Tai is just 1.5 km tall — hardly Tien Shan with Peak Victory.

There are minimal issues with Huawei’s HarmonyOS 5 operating system, but Taishan doesn’t yet have full functionality with a master account.

The Verdict: Should You Buy a Voyah Taishan?

Pros:

Strong value compared to BMW X3 pricing
Genuinely handsome from up close
Cozy, well-equipped interior with great massage seats
Rear-wheel steering on mid-trim
Powerful and refined hybrid drivetrain
Quiet, seamless ICE integration
Big battery and fuel tank for long-range comfort

Cons:

Cramped third row for a 5.2-meter SUV
Modest cargo area with cheap-feeling trim
Three-chamber suspension delivers float without composure
Magic Carpet system has visible limits on rough roads
Made me motion-sick within five minutes

Three-chamber suspension and four-lidar tech alongside the Maybach-inspired styling are meant to set the Voyah flagship apart from its many rivals. Whether they actually do — that’s a question for the test track. Stay tuned.